Trivial Chatter
Whirrr— Clack. Clack. Clack. A robot tucked in the corner activated on its own and glided smoothly over to set drinks on the table. Still perched on the edge of my seat like it was made of needles, I watched the machine with cautious eyes. It looked familiar, and then I remembered—it was identical to the one I’d seen inside the building earlier. Once everything was arranged, it returned to its station and powered down.
The man who had come here with me lifted his glass without hesitation and drained it in one go. He set the cup down hard enough to make the table rattle, then narrowed his eyes.
“You… You’re supposed to be the head of the investigation team. What the hell is that disaster zone out front? It’s even worse than the last time I was here. Try cleaning once in a while.”
“Why should I? The robot will take care of it once things get messy enough. If it hasn’t cleaned yet, that just means the AI decided this is still a livable environment.”
The woman answered calmly, as if the remark hadn’t bothered her at all. A livable environment… On one hand it sounded perfectly rational, yet it sent a chill down my spine. What she really meant was that she had no intention of cleaning anytime soon. The place had already looked filthy when I first saw it; if it got any worse, I couldn’t even imagine what kind of hell it would become. Clearly, her definition of “dirty” was a space no living creature could survive in. Even the tiny semi-basement room I used to live in had been cleaner than this.
He seemed just as shocked by her answer. I could see the disbelief in his eyes shift into outright horror. Now that I thought about it, the spot he’d occupied back at the office had been simple and spotless. They say a person’s workspace reveals their true nature, so to someone who clearly valued cleanliness, the chaos we’d just walked through must have looked like the end of the world.
Watching the two of them bicker, I suddenly felt a strange sense of déjà vu. I’d seen this scene somewhere before. After a moment’s thought, I remembered the conversation between him and Hae-jin after we escaped the dungeon and reached the temporary base. Back then he had been the one getting scolded; now the roles were reversed. The old saying really was true—there’s always someone above the person on top.
While he was still talking, the woman—who had clearly stopped listening—suddenly leaned forward across the table, a bright smile spreading across her face.
“More importantly, tell me how it felt to experience that space firsthand! I put so much effort into that little masterpiece. How did you figure out the trick?”
He gave her an uncomfortable look as she abruptly changed the subject. Still, I was curious too. From the outside it had just looked like an endless corridor—how had he seen through it? He clearly didn’t want to explain, but after glancing at my sparkling eyes beside him, he let out a small sigh and spoke.
“First, I’ve never heard of a corridor this long existing inside an underground facility. But that alone wasn’t enough. From here on, it’s hard to explain with words alone… When you spend a long time fighting for your life in a twisted world like a dungeon, one sense naturally develops. It’s the ability to perceive the space around you based on where you’re standing. You know how you get chills when you sense killing intent from an enemy whose position you can’t pinpoint? It’s something like that.”
He spoke calmly, arms crossed. The story sounded far-fetched, yet there wasn’t a trace of falsehood in his voice.
“Right after stepping off the elevator, I felt something strange I couldn’t quite put into words. Mm, simply put… the door was open, but you couldn’t actually walk through it. And after walking for about ten minutes, I was almost certain some kind of trick had been cast over the entire space.”
“……”
I couldn’t hide my shock as I listened. I’d sensed something off partway through, but by the end it had gone far beyond common sense. The woman, however, simply nodded with an intrigued expression.
“Hmm… I see. Honestly, I don’t understand a word of it, but you’re already an extraordinary being who’s surpassed common sense. As someone who relies on her brain, I’ll just have to accept it. I figured something like this might happen. Still, your description gave me chills.”
At that moment, a blue light shone across the table and formed a three-dimensional image. I stared at it in wonder and realized it was the infinite corridor we had just passed through. The woman extended one hand and waved it through the air.
“My description was accurate. You two saw an endlessly stretching hallway, but in reality it was a dead end completely blocked off. The only reason it looked that way was because I used a rather special technique.”
“…You mean holograms?”
“Close, but not quite. This system calculates the viewer’s eye position, pupil movement, and light angles based on the AI, then projects the most natural corridor image possible. Behind that hologram, new blocks are laid one by one according to the viewer’s walking speed, continuously creating the hallway. The soundproofing is perfect, so the person walking through it never notices the blocks moving.”
The blue model on the table smoothly recreated the scene at her command. The blocking wall lowered while a new corridor formed, and the two figures walking along it passed through the newly risen blocks without the slightest hesitation. So that was what had been happening beyond our line of sight. Seeing it from an objective perspective felt strangely different.
The man, who had been listening quietly, narrowed his eyes and spoke in a sharp voice.
“If you can control sight and sound that perfectly, the camouflage is nearly flawless. But there are obvious spatial limitations. What if someone on the corridor suddenly accelerates and sprints forward?”
“I considered that too. In that case, I’d raise the block-lowering speed as much as possible, and if that still isn’t enough, I’d have no choice but to drop the hologram and lower a barrier. That part is beyond what the technology can handle.”
The woman readily admitted the flaw he pointed out. Then she plucked the straw from her cup and pointed it at him like a weapon.
“Besides, you’re the strange one for seeing through the trick so easily. I’ve tested it on several people before, and none of them figured it out even after hours. Unless the intruder is a monster on your level, no one should be able to notice it.”
She pouted, clearly displeased. It was only natural—she had poured her heart into her masterpiece, only for him to see through it at once and even point out its weaknesses.
After that, the hologram on the table vanished and a brief silence fell. I sat there, clutching my cup with both hands and shrinking into myself while rolling my eyes around the room. It was my best attempt at drawing as little attention as possible. Unfortunately, the exact situation I’d feared still happened.
The woman’s gaze, which had been wandering like a predator searching for prey, landed squarely on me. When our eyes met, she didn’t look away—instead, a subtle smile curved her lips. That confirmed it.
As expected, she rested her chin on the table and tilted her head at an angle, a thick smile spreading across her face. There was no malice in it, yet something about the expression made me deeply uneasy.
“Come to think of it, that topic must have been a little difficult for a child. We can’t have you feeling left out while sitting right here! Is there anything you’re curious about? You can ask about me, or we can talk about something else entirely.”
“……”
Was that really a pure intention, or was she probing me? Logically, it should have been the former. But an inexplicable sense of danger prickled across my skin—probably because I already knew this woman wasn’t normal. Still, there was no need to speak up. If I truly had no questions, she wouldn’t find it strange.
I had decided to stay silent, but then one of the questions I’d had earlier floated back into my mind. Since it didn’t seem particularly dangerous to ask, I voiced it.
“…I heard there’s a research division underground, but this doesn’t look like it at all. When we were coming here, it didn’t seem that way…”
I fiddled with my cup as I spoke carefully. I felt a little nervous, but contrary to my expectations, the woman answered kindly.
“Oh? You’ve got a sharp eye. That’s right—this isn’t exactly the research division. More precisely, it’s a facility that manages the overall state of the entire headquarters, located between the divisions. It’s hidden underground in case the surface base is suddenly attacked by monsters or other entities.”
“…Hey, that’s supposed to be classified information. Are you sure you should be telling her that?”
When he frowned and snapped at her, the woman smiled faintly.
“What does it matter~? I’ve already shown her almost everything anyway. Besides, if this child were really a dangerous person, she wouldn’t be able to leave here anyway— Ahem! Oh dear, what am I saying… Ahaha.”
I felt like I’d just heard something enormous. Watching her laugh meaninglessly, a chill crept down my spine. This woman really was dangerous. I had let my guard down at her friendly tone for a moment, but now I swallowed hard and tensed up again.
The atmosphere in the room had turned strange, so the woman suddenly stood up and spoke in a bright voice.
“Well, I think we’ve covered most of what we needed to say, so let’s get moving! These things are best finished quickly so we can all relax~ I’ll wait for you by the door!”
With that, she hurried out of the room as if fleeing. Only the two of us remained. I stared blankly toward the door she had disappeared through.
…Could I really make it out of here safely?
In the deep silence that filled the room, I truly wondered.